The orange and blue struggled through a 2-11-1 season. The team, however, was an audience winner on KTLN 1280 AM, with the late Bob Martin, the legendary play-by-play man, calling games.

Martin, sensing the popularity of an essentially ragtag outfit, created a weeknight, one-hour call-in show where Broncos fans could discuss the team. (Was Jacky Lee really the team’s quarterback of the future?)

Martin was the father of Denver sports talk radio.

Segue to today, where five Denver stations produce full-time sports operations, with the emphasis on Monday-Friday talk shows, mixing often-rowdy opinion with calls from listeners and interviews with guests. The stations churn out more than 700 hours a week of sports talk in a tone and style that has changed dramatically since Martin, a quiet, erudite man whose musical tastes leaned toward Beethoven, first requested that fans call in to chat about the Broncos.

A rundown:

• The Fan (104.3 FM) and ESPN radio (1600 AM) are operated by the Lincoln Financial Group, a high-profile national sports broadcasting organization.

• Mile High Sports radio (simulcast on 1510 AM and 93.7 FM), is owned by a local company that also produces Mile High Sports magazine.

Starting in January, the sports radio list will increase when ESPN moves from 1600 AM to an undetermined dial position. Potential spots: 101.5 FM, a rock station owned by Front Range, or another outlet purchased by the company.

The obvious question: Can all of these talk-oriented, all-sports stations survive, particularly during difficult economic times?

Strong market gets stronger

Pocky Marranzino, co-president of Karsh/ Hagan Advertising and a 30-year veteran of the Denver business scene, adopts a “wait-and-see” philosophy.

“We have five stations all basically offering the same content in a crowded broadcasting and Internet era,” Marranzino said. “The advertising competition is fierce. And the five operations are competing against an explosion of media choices that didn’t exist 15 years ago. . . . A lot depends on how the stations utilize their resources regarding expenses and personnel.”

Marranzino notes Denver has owned a reputation as a strong sports town, initially because of rabid Broncos fan support.

“That original solid Broncos fan base has expanded because of the growing popularity of the Rockies, Nuggets, Avalanche and Rapids,” he said.

He points out that the metro Denver market is considered a strong, important “broadcast island” to national and local advertisers. “We’re between Los Angeles and Chicago, which makes Denver an attractive market buy,” he said.

Another positive factor: The area’s growing Hispanic population (now about 20 percent) will provide a sports radio advertising boom, particularly for ESPN Deportes.

Marranzino agrees with local station programmers that the major key to success is getting “captive” listeners during weekday morning and evening drive shows.

The Denver radio market is not alone in this sports chatter explosion, which has been driven by the incredible popularity of sports on television. Keep in mind that the Fox broadcasting network and cable entities such as ESPN, Versus, Root Sports and The Mtn. didn’t exist in 1964.

Thus, there were fewer events to watch and listen to, and fewer opportunities for fans to chew on the results and debate what they’d just seen on TV. Today, most major cities have at least two all-sports radio stations.

The battle for local sports talk dominance reached its apex last July when sales and marketing executive Tom Manoogian, known on radio as “Lou from Littleton,” put together a consortium of investors to form The Ticket and bring Spanish-speaking ESPN Deportes into the market. The two stations traded dial positions in April, with The Ticket moving to 102.3 FM and ESPN Deportes to 87.7 FM.

While the arrival of The Ticket accentuated the battle for talk supremacy, the first big competitive shots were fired a year earlier when Manoogian, working as a program broker, signed KCNC-Channel 4’s Vic Lombardi and Gary Miller to host a 7-9 a.m. show on ESPN radio. The show created a major buzz, partially because of a heavy promotional campaign on Channel 4. The two now host the same show in the same time period on The Ticket.

Manoogian, never at a loss for words — on or off the radio — constantly drives home the importance of “local programming.” That was the selling point to a team of 22 investors, including Dealin’ Doug Moreland, who are financing The Ticket.

“Fans want to hear local and national reaction to key sports events from local, savvy personalities,” Manoogian said.

He considers The Fan as The Ticket’s key rival — a rivalry that has an added intensity because Tim Spence, former program director at Lincoln Financial’s two sports outlets, has similar duties at Front Range.

Move to FM ahead of the trend

Bob Call, vice president and general manager of Lincoln Financial’s five Denver radio properties, put KKFN 950 AM, Denver’s first all-sports station, on the air in 1995. And local broadcasters believe Call, on the Denver radio scene for 30 years, was ahead of the FM curve when he moved The Fan to 104.3 FM in 2008.

Nate Lundy, program director of The Fan and ESPN 1600, said the latter frequency will remain a sports outlet, stressing talk, although the programming lineup hasn’t been formulated. Local programmers agree that FM, which dominates the music world, is gaining momentum as a talk- show haven.

“We have a great mix of local and national professionals,” Call said.

And, he asks rhetorically: “When it comes to local experts, who knows the Broncos better than Mark Schlereth and Alfred Williams?” Schlereth and Williams, along with Darren Mc-Kee, host The Fan’s afternoon drive-time show.

On the surface, Mile High Sports radio might be the odd station out in this battle for listeners, particularly since it lost three talents — Les Shapiro, a veteran sports broadcaster, Joel Klatt and Nate Kreckman — to The Ticket last year. But James Merilatt, president of Mile High Sports, believes there’s an “Everyman loyalty” between his station’s hosts and listeners.

Mile High also operates on a different financial arrangement. Unlike its rivals, who have sales staffs who sell commercial time to advertisers, Mile High program hosts pitch their programs to potential sponsors. And the salary base of the talent is based on their ability to sell.

“This provides spirited competition,” Merilatt said, “and it cuts down on the station payroll.”

While Arbitron audience ratings are closely watched by station executives, the current sports talk battle centers more on advertising sales and promotion of talent. Unlike television, which produces overnight audience figures, Arbitron provides weekly results. Recent Arbitron reports show The Fan, with its mix of talk and high-profile play-by-play, is the most-listened-to outlet, followed by ESPN 1600.

Meanwhile, KOA 850 AM continues to provide a major intrusion into this full-time radio sports battle. The 50,000-watt Clear Channel property is a sports broadcasting powerhouse because it owns rights to broadcast the Broncos, Rockies and CU football.

It’s a crowded marketplace featuring often-bombastic hosts who utilize rap, soul and rock as musical backgrounds, when they are not pitching products to buy.

So, a question to ponder: Would Bob Martin fit into any of today’s sports talk operations?

Longtime Denver journalist Dusty Saunders writes about sports media each Monday in The Denver Post. Reach him at tvtime@comcast.net.

Lineups

A look at the live play-by-play coverage on Denver sports stations:

The Fan (104.3 FM, ESPN 1600 AM)

Through Westwood One, a major sports syndication broadcaster, and ESPN. Coverage is interchangeable on the two stations:

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Tyreek Hill didn’t know what to do when he started hearing thousands of people in Arrowhead Stadium chanting his name, even as he stood all alone on the frozen turf waiting for the punt.